Is there any fluff/fiction that goes into a little detail on these? P.335 in the Space Wolves omnibus talks about the Inquisitors commander of his guardsman having three in his head like the ones elite space marines have.

Pardon my newbishness, but are these the plain studs I occasionally see in some of the artwork?

Just curious. Thanks for any answers.

I've always seen them referred to as Campaign Studs myself.

AFAIK a Space Marine gets one stud for ech century as fully initiated battle brother (clad in his power armour;beyond the time of being a scout). So 3 studs meaning this Marine is a Veteran of 300 years service. That goes for the Codex Chapters. Space Wolves, Dark Angels oder Black Templer could handle this differently.

Sources are a bit vague on this, in some texts they say, a Marine gehts his stud for a decade in other for a century, but mostly it is said: 100 years = 1 stud

I see. Thanks alot. I figured it was something to that extent. He refers to them as honour studs, but I know how fiction can contradict itself.

I guess in William Kings world guardsmen get them too. Hmmph.

I don't think it is 100 years per stud... The last figures I heard were 10 years per standard stud and 50 years per different coloured stud (maybe gold).

borithan said:

I've heard all of those, and other descriptions besides.

The easiest resolution is that different chapters have different approaches regarding such ornamentation - some giving them out as marks of service (particularly long service - I've heard them called Service Studs for this very reason), others for particular accomplishments, to remind of particular campaigns (completely spur-of-the-moment example: every Marine who survived the ill-fated Charybdis campaign bears a brass stud in the shape of a fist grasping a lightning bolt to remember the fallen) or to denote rank or standing within the Chapter. It might even be that the Deathwatch Marines in a particular region may have a distinct tradition of honour studs, denoting time served (years, decades) in the Deathwatch, missions completed, great enemies slain ("and this one denotes the Hive Tyrant I dealt the killing blow to on Aegarsworld") and so on.

Every stud could have a different meaning, signified by a different appearance, material, as defined by a whole range of different chapter traditions.

The service studs have been around since Rogue Trader. IIRC (my RT book is at home) originally it was 1 stud for every 100 years. Somewhere else in later books, it was mentioned as 10 years instead. This may have been a typo or it could have been intentional. Now all we can do is speculate more about what each chapter uses unless it is specifically mentioned in an official write up somewhere.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

This is basically the general approach I am going with. Thanks alot guys.

According to the Insignium Astartes book, a single service stud is used to record 10, 50 or 100 years of service depending on its design and the Chapters traditions. It also states that in recent years the use of service studs has been on the decline and fewer Chapters continue the practice.

So the Crux is does the chapter the PC's come from still use service studs? If I can't find any cannon for the chapters my players are playing, then we will working it out together and let it be law in our verse from that point forward.

Hope that helps.

if my memories are good there's three kind of studs used for the time spend into the service of the emperor:

-rectangular studs goes for 10 years service

-eagle shape studs goes for 50 years of service

-round studs for 100 years.

So you can find a SM with 1 ROUND STUD + 1 EAGLE + 2 RECTANGLE it meens that the SM has spent 170 years on active service.

Then there's honour studs who are given for some deed or campaign.

Personally I reckon honour studs should give +3% Toughness as a chapter trapping/minor relic upgrade. Old Marines are tougher than power armoured boot leather after all.

On DW pg.271 theres a sidebar about honours and rewards. It states that space amrine honours are beyong the scope of the core book but rules will be included in future supplements. Just hang fire for a bit and we might see official rules for service studs in a few months.

Wargamer said:

Yay! I didn't see that, thanks. I made a thread about that a few weeks ago and already had given up hope on it.

Does anybody but me would like to see a brief official expension by FFG for Final Sanction and Oblivion's Edge? Kinda like how many Requisition points for the scenarios? And frankly.. the OE scenario should earn the surviving PCs honours of some sort. Even if it's just a kneepad mark. Anyway the ghist of it is - please some additional info for running the scenarios with the full rulebook.

Personally I would tie honours to spectacular feats in combat or renown gained in a single scenario. As well as possibly honours based in renown gained within a single campaign (ie fighting Hive Fleet Dagon).

Alex

honor studs http://redelf.narod.ru/w40k/ia/insignium/23_honourbadges.html